How many achievement points can you add via downloads? How many points must a …

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The idea of achievements is kind of an odd one when you take a step back and look at it: you get points for fulfilling certain requirements in games, and those points all add up to one meta "gamerscore." What does this score get you? Nothing, except bragging rights. My own score is on the low end—I have yet to crack the 5,000-point mark—and while I don't really worry about achievement points these days, I do play for them if I see an interesting one. Survive a level without firing? That's fun. Max out the power of a weapon? Neat. It adds a way of playing the game differently than you might have done normally, and gives you a little pat on the back for it. I enjoy that. Microsoft is now trying to normalize how achievement points are doled out between games. The new rules are laid out on the Gamerscore blog:

All regular disc-based games MUST have 1,000 Gamerscore in the
base game. This means that any consumer who buys a retail game will
have the opportunity to unlock the full 1,000 Gamerscore without having
to pay for any add-on content. Note that a publisher may decide to
deliver a portion of this Gamerscore via add-on content, but the add-on
content will always be free to the consumer.

Game publishers will have the option to deliver another 250
incremental Gamerscore on top of the 1,000 via add-on content from
Marketplace. This add-on content could be either free or paid. So if
you complete a game and earn the full 1,000 GS, you could by getting
new add-on content earn up to a total of 1,250 points from a game.

Xbox Live Arcade games will operate in similar fashion, but
given the size of these titles they will allow you to earn up to 200
Gamerscore from every game and up to another 50 points from add-on
content.

It's nice seeing a clarification of what publishers can do with achievement points when it comes to downloadable content, I've always wondered what the rules were about adding points via paid downloads. I've worried in the past about for-pay downloads being abused this way, and having the 250 point limit allays those fears somewhat. Achievement points were wildly uneven in the early lifecycle of the 360—with games like Madden or King Kong you could earn a ton of points with minimal work—so I'm hoping the points will even out a little bit between games. Besides, if you get bored you can always make up your own achievements.